


Not By Half

by stephanericher



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Birthday, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-04
Updated: 2015-11-04
Packaged: 2018-04-29 20:55:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5142167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stephanericher/pseuds/stephanericher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shougo spends his birthday the way he'd like it</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not By Half

**Author's Note:**

> happy belated bday shougo-kun~

His mom leaves an extra 5,000 yen on the table in the morning and his brother leaves a note scrawled on the back of an old receipt (he could have used the front if he’d wanted; the ink’s already faded) that he’s making dinner tonight but they’re already gone by the time Shougo wakes up even though it’s barely light.

He could go to school today—he should go to school. He’s supposed to go to school. He’s supposed to go every day, technically, and he has all year; he hasn’t even missed a single basketball practice. It hasn’t been out of some newfound sense of brown-nosing duty or some shit like that, but because he needs to get good enough grades to graduate and because, well. Basketball won’t be forever. Soon enough he’ll be just another worker of some kind and if the days are as exhausting as the adults he know complain they are, he’s not going to have as much time for it. And it’s not because he loves basketball with his truest heart or some poetic literary crap like that. But he enjoys it, and like it or not it’s been the one constant in his life when his address changes every other year and the people he knows at about the same rate.

There’s no practice today, though; the captain had arranged it so they could “rest up for the tournament” and Shougo had halfway wanted to object—not because that extra day is going to make much of a different, but because the captain thinks they’re going to get somewhere close to the Winter Cup. He’s still caught up in the team the way it was their first year, when Ishida was running the show—and he was a better captain than Shougo had been willing to give him credit for at the time. And the guys now don’t suck, but they’re not going to compete with the top teams. They have no secret ace up their shooting sleeves; they just kind of are. And they’re not bad guys (particularly Matsuda, who lets Shougo copy his math homework sometimes), and even if they’re not going to be Shougo’s lifelong True Friends hanging out with them is alright.

But Matsuda was sick yesterday and Shougo hasn’t done his own math homework and today he’s finally eighteen and he’s got a little bit of cash to spend, so why not play hooky for old time’s sake?

* * *

 

He gets an early train to Tokyo, sitting next to a businessman who’s half-asleep in his newspaper. Halfway through the trip the games on his phone get boring so Shougo ends up staring out the window at the decaying leaves clinging to the trees like snot-nosed kids to the wall pretending no one sees them peeking out from behind the curtain. They’re turning yellow and red like Christmas lights, and it’s just late enough in the year for him to be struck by how close it is to ending.

He reads an article about commodities over the old man’s shoulder.

* * *

He replaces the earring he’d lost last weekend at the store where he’d first gotten one ear pierced. The man behind the counter doesn’t recognize him, but it’s to be expected. He didn’t have the height or the hairstyle back then and was just another loud punk kid pretending to be some kind of badass because he was willing to pay someone to poke a hole in his skin.

The new earring isn’t quite the same style as the old one, but it looks the same if he squints and Shougo doubts anyone will really notice (and he’ll probably forget himself soon enough). He walks back outside and the breeze hits him, biting him just the way he likes it—too cold for Tokyo this time of year usually, but he’ll take it. He stuffs his hands into the pockets of his hoodie and walks on, through the half-familiar streets. Most of the places he remembers are gone, changed—storefronts have been remodeled, boarded up, replaced; buildings have been torn down and construction sites are now deluxe parking lots or fancy hotels or just buildings already fading into the aesthetic of the neighborhood.

He buys a fast food meal with the last of the money from his mother and sits in the park to watch kids on the court while he eats it. Most of them suck, don’t even have the arm strength to really pass or attempt a sot; most of them probably won’t even play in high school. One of them elbows another in the face; a third kid punches the elbower and a brawl breaks out. One of the other kids tries to break it up; the rest ignore him. A bird lands next to Shougo’s foot and peeps loudly at him. He tosses down half of an overdone fry, soggy with grease and condensation from the bottom of the bag. The bird peeps and hops over to it; another follows. The kids on the court have managed to finish their fight; the one who got elbowed picks up the ball again and shouts for a tip-off.

Shougo balls up the empty, greasy paper bag and shoots it toward the garbage can. It lands with a soft thump; he leans back against the bench and grins. A passing girl in a middle-school uniform gives him a quick, apprehensive glance. Shougo sighs and looks up.

The sky is still light blue, only slightly darker than that hideous shade of his middle school uniform shirt, but it’s getting pretty late in the day. He’s going to have to get home in time for dinner (even if, for once, he’s not the one making it) and he doesn’t have enough cash left to buy a train ticket at the moment, so streetball it is (the best thing about this city is that he’s never too far from a street court where someone’s game to take him on).

A chubby but clearly very dexterous man jerks his head from the half-court line on the other side of the fence from the brawling kids; he’d seen Shougo toss the bag in the trash. Shougo grins.

“How much?”

* * *

 

Shougo dozes off on the train ride back, face pressed against the cheap glass of the window. He hadn’t totally destroyed his opponent, but he’d laid it on pretty thick, pulling out a bunch of his favorite moves. And it had felt good, loose, free—he can’t get a good one-on-one like that in Shizuoka, and team matches just aren’t like that. Even when he’s going toe-to-toe against whoever the other school has, it’s still too limited; there are still eight other players on the court, and coaches and referees and things like that.

Shougo’s feet press down against the floor and it’s then he notices acutely how thin the soles of his sneakers are wearing. He should have tried to win more money playing ball so he could get more sooner, or maybe he should have waited with the earring. He sighs. The rapidly-darkening sky is full of clouds; wet leaves are sticking to the other side of the glass, brown-stained yellow like an overripe banana.

* * *

 

The apartment smells like the inside of a deep fryer; his brother’s frying chicken in the best pan and the burger and fries seem like they were years ago. Shougo heads toward his room to dump his bag when he notices a badly-wrapped box on the table.

“Aww, did you buy me a present?”

“Damn right I did!” his brother calls. “Are you going to open it?”

“Yeah, just give me a second.”

There’s more tape than wrapping paper on the box; he has to wrestle with it for a few more seconds than he should, but the paper finally tears enough to reveal a blue box with a very familiar logo on it. And if his brother’s pranking him with this, Shougo’s going to kill him—but he pulls off the top very carefully anyway and then lifts the sheet of paper lying on top.

The shoes are shinier than most of the in-store display models, gleaming and fresh with thick reinforced soles and soft insets and perfect laces, and when Shougo had thought about new shoes he’d meant a less-costly model so as not to dig in the money he needs for train fare and buying enough drinks for enough different women in clubs before one of them decides she might actually talk to him.

He doesn’t notice his brother until he gets hit on the back of the head with the handle of the spatula.

“You’re welcome, asshole.”

He turns around and shoves his brother, too lightly to even push him into the wall. This birthday hasn’t been half-bad.


End file.
